Chương 400: 183.Day One 1

Before leaving campus, I made a detour to the security office. Not because I'd suddenly developed a passion for my job, or because the Council's institutional brainwashing had finally upgraded me into the kind of model cadre who voluntarily seeks to understand campus operations. No. Don't overestimate me. I just figured that since I was destined to be dragged back here as unpaid labor over the break, I might as well know exactly how I was going to be used. That's not initiative. That's survival.

The security office sat by the main gate. The window was cracked open a finger-width; the heater inside was going full blast, mixing with the stale scent of old tea, uniform jackets, and copier paper that had lived together too long. On duty was a middle-aged guard. He'd clearly gotten used to seeing Seitokai and Disciplinary people like me coming and going; when he saw me standing in the doorway wearing an expression that said I'm here to check how I die, he didn't even look surprised. Just waved me in.

"Vice President?" He gave me a once-over.

"Here about New Year duty?" I nodded with deep, ceremonial grief.

"Yeah. I want to know whether I'm coming in as a person, or as part of the infrastructure." He blinked, then laughed.

"Relax, it's not that bad." That kind of opener is always dangerous. Whenever humans say "not that bad," what follows is usually a detailed explanation of how bad it actually is. So I dragged a chair over and sat down, ready to attend my own holiday funeral briefing with full seriousness. He really was helpful, though. He walked me through the basics: days meant watching the gate, logging entries, doing a loop, and tracking temporary ins and outs.

Nights meant waiting for the last teacher or two to leave, locking what needed locking, logging what needed logging, and doing one more pass around the dorms and the main building perimeter. In theory, it was duty. In practice, as long as nobody got the brilliant idea to show up and cause trouble during the holidays, most of the time leaned toward—"... leaned toward what?" I prompted. He glanced left and right, even though it was just the two of us, then lowered his voice out of professional habit.

"Toward formality," he said.

"You're free labor anyway. After the teachers leave and the gate's locked, if nothing's up, go to sleep. Don't spook yourselves. And don't patrol so hard you carve a new national border in the snow." I stared at him for two seconds.... Oh. That actually didn't sound terrible. Not that the duty system itself was suddenly wonderful. It still deserved yelling at.

But if the night shift boiled down to locking up, logging out, maybe one or two lazy loops, and spending the rest of the time in the security office reading or sneaking a nap, then the whole thing climbed from please just shoot me all the way up to fine, I guess I'll hold off ordering the memorial photo. I felt a faint, almost human affection for the security office.

"I see." I nodded, serious.

"So the real core competency here isn't devotion. It's looking like devotion." He laughed twice instead of answering, and lifted his tea with a you get it expression. Exactly. If civilization works at all, it's not because the systems are perfect. It's because everyone inside them quietly knows which parts to follow to the letter, and which parts to leave breathing room in. I was in a slightly better mood when I stood to leave.

The guard, still in a generous mood, added:"But if they pair you with the Disciplinary Committee, that's down to luck." My foot froze mid-step.

"What do you mean?" He put on a very veteran look.

"Some of them actually patrol," he said.

"Especially the Chair. She doesn't look like the type who'll let you sleep through till morning." Ah. Great. So it wasn't just the rules. It was also who you drew as a teammate. Instantly, the hope I'd just dragged back from the brink started to crack again. — By the time I got back to No. 22 Platinum Bridge Street with this half-comforting, half-ominous intel, the living room lights were already on.

The moment I opened the door, the smell hit me—hot tea, coffee, and some fried something that someone had brought back. Not refined. A bit chaotic. But it carried that very particular okay, the day isn't completely ruined yet feeling. Jess was the first to spot me. She was half-sprawled over the arm of the sofa like a cat preparing to sue civilized society, and when she saw me she raised a hand.

"Vice President's back," she said, eyes narrowing with the professional joy of a news anchor about to report on a disaster.

"Well? Did you get sentence reduction, or just execution details?"

"Both." I tugged my scarf off and hooked it by the door.

"Good news: night shift theoretically doesn't require us to circle campus like loyal hounds until dawn. Bad news: that assumes the teachers leave when they're supposed to, and the gate actually locks." D was in the single armchair, a can of coffee in his hand. He lifted his gaze at that.

"So essentially we're minors cleaning up after the adults," he said.

"I hate how accurate that is," I said. Harvey was sitting at the coffee table, leafing through a photocopied campus layout from god-knew-where. After I finished, the first thing he asked wasn't tired? or is the heater any good? It was:"After the gate's locked, if someone staying on campus suddenly needs to go out, who opens it?" Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. I paused, then looked at him.

"The duty officers, once they confirm the situation. Why?"

"Just clarifying." Harvey had a lollipop in his mouth and still sounded half-asleep.

"If there's a rule, I like to know where in the rule the headache lives." D glanced at him.

"You sound like you're workshopping elegant crime." Harvey blinked, all innocence.

"No. I'm workshopping how to avoid leaving a record."

"See?" Jess slapped the sofa arm, grinning at me.

"This is why I like hanging around you people. All we did was schedule holiday duty, and the air already smells like premeditation."

"That smell is called 'bad omen,' not aroma," I said, tossing my gloves onto the table. At the dining table, Roy sat with a pen, a fresh form, and a cup of hot tea Lan had placed by his hand. The two of them were still giving off that same strange aura—not overt sweetness, more that slow, heavy kind of pressure you get when two people have been running the same routines around each other for too long. Roy frowned at the paper, Lan quietly uncapped his pen for him.

Lan bent over another sheet, and without asking, Roy nudged his cup half an inch toward her: you should drink too. That level of practiced coordination wasn't "close." It was have probably already argued over whether to buy a single or double electric blanket close. I looked away before the dog food compromised my nutritional balance this close to break. Maki sat at the head of the table, a few freshly printed sheets at her elbow. When she saw me, she checked the time, then me.

"Good timing." From Maki, that line usually meant one of two things. One, it really was. Two, I wasn't getting out of this. Given the date and my life history, I was betting heavily on option two. I sat, pulling a chair out across from her.

"President, that sounded a lot like 'the defendant will now enter the courtroom.'""It means you understand your situation," she said.

"That doesn't make me feel better." She ignored that. Instead, she squared up the sheets and slid them into the center.

"Teacher schedules over the break might still shift, so for now I'm only announcing the first three days." Jess straightened. Not out of dedication. Just because other people's misfortune fueled her.

"Excellent," she said, hands steepled, voice solemn as a death-row reporter.

"Commence the public execution of our first three days." Maki didn't rise to it. She just read.

"December twenty-fifth. Day shift: me and Hoshino. Night shift: Roy and Lan." I was silent for a beat. Then looked at Roy. He looked back with the face of a man informed he'd be spending Christmas night in bed with a final budget report. Lan stayed calm—so calm she even nudged the sheet closer to him.

"At least we're on nights," she said.

"We can rest first."

"The 'at least' sounds logical," I said.

"But to the victims it just sounds like the universe is kinder to the dog-food unit." Jess threw up a hand.

"Exactly. Institutional bias. Why do they get to spend Christmas night in a pair while our Vice President has to spend Christmas Day in twelve hours of high-density official business with the President?"

"Jess, the most suspicious word in that sentence isn't 'official business,' it's 'high-density,'" I said coldly. Hedwig sat to Maki's left. At that, she set her cup down very gently and looked over the schedule. She didn't say anything. Which somehow made it feel more like she was committing it to memory. Maki went on.

"December twenty-sixth. Day shift: Hedwig and Disciplinary A. Night shift: Hoshino and Freya Nikaido." I shut my eyes. Perfect. Just yesterday I'd been thinking night duty might be easy. Today reality happily reminded me: systems never let you stay comfortable for long. Jess was already laughing, not bothering to keep it down.

"Vice President, that's some quality luck. Day one with the President. Day two with the Chair of Disciplinary. This isn't a duty roster; it's the Passion Week."

"First, it's not my Passion Week, it's the Education Ministry's evidence exhibit," I said.

"Second, you're this happy because your name isn't on here."

"Naturally." Jess propped her chin on her hands with zero shame.

"Other people's suffering is an important part of my emotional health." D added from the side:"She's honest."

"Honesty's a virtue," Jess said.

"No, in your case it's a symptom," I said. Harvey checked the sheet again, voice even flatter than before.

"So your second night, you'll run through the teacher exit procedure once."

"Yeah." I turned.

"You have a point?" He pulled the lollipop out, tapping it against the page I'd brought back from the security office.

"It means you'll be ahead of everyone else on locks, access points, handover, and emergency gate procedures." I stared at him for two seconds.

"If your next words are 'that'll be handy,' I'm dumping you in a snowbank." He smirked and lifted both hands in surrender.

"It's just that your XP is levelling fast."

"Still sounds ominous." Maki didn't let us wander for long. She pressed a finger to the third line.

"December twenty-seventh. Day shift: me and Disciplinary B. Night shift: Hoshino and Hedwig." This time the room went still. Not long. Just enough. For Jess's smile to sharpen. I didn't answer immediately. Just looked down at that line. Night shift. Me and Hedwig. If it were just a schedule, it would have been nothing. Two people on duty overnight. Work, process, handover, lights out, locks checked, survive till dawn. Administrative. Inhuman. Clean.

The problem was: put certain names under "night shift," and everything started growing extra layers. Hedwig regarded the line in silence, then said, steady as ever:"Understood. I'll have the required files and warming supplies ready." She said it so correctly that even teasing felt like admitting you were the one with the dirty mind. Naturally, Jess's talent lay precisely in extracting entertainment from serious air.

"Oh, warming supplies already," she cooed, clapping her hands.

"That's premium colleague care. Vice President, are you touched?"

"I'm more touched by the thought that if you keep talking, you'll need medical supplies first."

"Classic defensive aggression."

"It's called pre-emptive self-defense." This time, Hedwig did look at me. It wasn't a long look. No obvious emotion. But for some reason it still felt like a light tap right to the sternum—one I was not allowed to show on my face. Maki pulled the sheet back in, her voice settling things again.

"That's the first three days. I'll update the rest once faculty confirms."

"So," I said, leaning back, summing it up very accurately, "what we have now isn't the full casualty report. Just wave one."

"As long as you understand that," Maki said.

"President, is your idea of reassurance these days just acknowledge reality?"

"Because that works on you." Too accurate. And too annoying for me to find a clean angle to argue from. Roy finally put his pen down and let out a long breath.

"I only want to confirm one thing," he said.

"If nights theoretically allow short rests after the teachers leave, does that mean Lan and I can at least bring food?" Lan tipped her head.

"That's your priority?" she asked.

"What else?" He looked exhausted.

"You want me to survive Christmas night on school heating and institutional brutality?" She paused for half a second, then nodded.

"Fair. I'll prep hot drinks." Jess clutched at her chest.

"Enough. I'm done. This isn't duty. It's turning forced labor into a couples' camping trip." D, ever helpful, refined it.

"Technically, a low-budget winter two-person camp," he said.

"You shut up," Jess and I said together. Harvey chuckled twice and went back to scanning the gate memo. His face barely moved, but I had the uncomfortable feeling he was already three branches deep into scenario trees based on those few lines of regulation. I let it lie. The earlier you ask, the more he'll feign ignorance. Better to wait and catch him red-handed if he actually tries something. Cleaner that way. As for me— Looking at those three lines, I had a feeling that was hard to categorize.

It wasn't simple bad luck. Bad luck is being assigned work. This felt more like fate had designed me a structured, three-stage mental stress test. Day one with Maki—low temperature, quiet, twelve hours locked in admin. Day two with Nikaido—rules, vigilance, and every sentence a potential flashpoint. Day three with Hedwig. That last one was the worst. Because the dangerous part wasn't danger.

It was knowing you were supposed to keep it as work, and knowing full well that some things might still grow their own meanings after midnight.

"Vice President." I blinked and realized Hedwig was watching me.

"Are you overthinking again?" she asked.

"No," I said with a straight face.

"I'm conducting an end-of-year risk assessment." Jess laughed.

"And the result?" I took a sip of the tea she'd slid over earlier, letting the heat tamp down the irritation long enough to speak.

"Preliminary conclusion: this break will not be peaceful." Maki nodded.

"Good. You're finally in the correct state."

"President, do you realize that every time you agree with me, my sense of doom gets worse?"

"Which proves your instincts are still functioning." The room laughed again. Outside, snow fell quietly. Inside, the lights were warm, the tea was hot, and everyone was still breathing—for now. We were supposed to be getting ready for a holiday. Instead we were crowded around a three-line sheet, talking about our fates like war-zone duty rotations. Ridiculous. And, somehow, routine. I stared at the lines and felt a laugh bubble up.

If the Federation's holiday system was an act of malice, then the Seitokai existed as the organ that adapted to it. We complained. We swore. And then we put the tea out, spread the forms, wedged ourselves into the cracks in the system, and pushed. Sniping at each other the whole way.... Thinking about it like that—it did sound a lot like us.